If you're excited for Batman Begins

Alright Nolan, you’ve finally won me over to Batman Begins, and in a big way. The movie still has that weird brown tint (almost like a muddy version of The Matrix green tint), but that’s just a piece of one thing this movie clearly has… style. If you haven’t yet, go download, check out, or hunt down the Batman Begins teaser that aired during the SuperBowl. The best high-res versions can be found here. Movie-List never gets enough credit.

Where the first couple of teasers were tepid, this is full of life, vision, and a firm grasp of what it is that people love about Batman. No, it isn’t his codpiece, nor is it his neon clad boy wonder. Nolan has everything firing all at once in this teaser, perfect score, right mix of action, dialogue, and Christian Bale voice over. Speaking of Bale, he doesn’t sound quite dark enough for Bats. Let’s hope that’s his Brucie voice.

I can’t help it though, now I’m just as excited about Batman Begins as everyone else. Zaphod may be missing a head or an arm, but Christopher Nolan’s take on Batman looks like it’s all there. I think I’m even starting to dig his dune buggy Batmobile.

Previewed by Joshua Tyler: 2005-01-13

A lot of people are really excited about Batman Begins and I guess I can’t blame them. It is Batman after all, and with the beautiful way Spider-Man has been treated lately; Batfans are bound to be suffering from a bit of envy. Besides, aside from a weird pic or two of the Bat-dunebuggy Christopher Nolan’s Dark Knight will be riding around in, it looks like this new direction for Batman is right on track, isn’t it?

It sounds good but the first teaser just wasn’t particularly inspiring. It looks so… stark… bland even. Granted, maybe I’m just used to being assaulted by the aural and visual train wreck of the last movie sporting the name “Batman”, but Nolan’s version just looks so PLAIN! Burton’s Batman wasn’t garish, but he did have a certain style. That’s really a big part of what I expect from America’s favorite man turned flying rodent.

The teaser raises questions about where Nolan is really going with this, and the few leaked shots of the Batsuit raise even more. Remember all those claims about how massively different this Batman would be? Back to basics right? Well the trailer is minimalist, but what about Bruce Wayne’s suit? It… hasn’t changed. Ok, granted, the nipples are gone (which I guess is good) but aside from the absent Bat logo (which really ought to be there thank you) his outfit looks the same. Still leather, still black, still pointed ears. I had this weird idea that Batman would be going back to spandex. Maybe doing that means you’re contractually obligated to bring back Adam West. If so, then I guess writer/director Christopher Nolan made the right call going back with rubbery leather. At least this version looks a bit more flexible.

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